Eric wrote:I completely disagree with this statement. Telling the truth for 16 straight pages is letting the newbies know this isn't always a picnic, and that they need to have their shit prepared. The ones who heed it & set up their camps better than they would have otherwise will definitely think it's positive when they get hit with their first white-out and don't have any major failures.

Not all good advice has to be delivered like we're talking to children, and snark is part of the playa.

Man...how did i know i was going to get shit for this?? That's really not what I meant. I agree with you actually. I meant that, for someone new to this forum, reading this thread for the first time, I can see how they would think "ohhh, these cranky vets are just trying to scare us!" It's so over the top at points that I almost started tuning out. Thankfully, there are a few people on here that can convey the seriousness of the situation...and all the while without having to deliver it like they're talking to children. Imagine that, there's a middle ground.

Eric wrote:I completely disagree with this statement. Telling the truth for 16 straight pages is letting the newbies know this isn't always a picnic, and that they need to have their shit prepared. The ones who heed it & set up their camps better than they would have otherwise will definitely think it's positive when they get hit with their first white-out and don't have any major failures.

Not all good advice has to be delivered like we're talking to children, and snark is part of the playa.

Man...how did i know i was going to get shit for this?? That's really not what I meant. I agree with you actually. I meant that, for someone new to this forum, reading this thread for the first time, I can see how they would think "ohhh, these cranky vets are just trying to scare us!" It's so over the top at points that I almost started tuning out. Thankfully, there are a few people on here that can convey the seriousness of the situation...and all the while without having to deliver it like they're talking to children. Imagine that, there's a middle ground.

Where do you see over the top in statements like "part of our camp got destroyed a few times" and "50mph winds"? This is da TRUTH!. It's pretty difficult to get across just how bad conditions can be, especially to virgins or to people for whom last year or even 2010 was their first year.

Veteran see things like this and think 'I'd better get more/longer rebar'. When we see newbs posting about tent stakes or like the thread, asking us for videos of disasters so he can convince his friends that their shade structure, which worked fine last year, isn't going to hack it this year?

We don't want to see your camp fly off. We don't want to be downwino of your camp flying off. We might joke, we might snark (actually we will joke and snark) but the intention is to convey to each other just what is happening out there. Weather is supposed to get a bit better next week when I'm heading out. But the 10 day forecast doesn't say anything about wino.

If you ask childish questions, you will be talked down to. If you ask these questions without doing a bit of self-reliant research, you will get snark.

weather man wrote:It was so windy last weekend, the top of the man base blew off! Last I heard, they were looking for a couple dozen guys with milkcrates to try and heft it back on....

This picture is looking southwest. The main street (spoke) behind the Manbase is 5:30 where the heavy equipment camp is. The path lead up and to the right of the ManBase leads to Center Camp. This picture was taken in the morning.